Happy Birthday: Michael Cimino (1939–2016)

Born: February 3, 1939 in New York City, New York, USA
Died: July 2, 2016 (age 77) in Los Angeles, California, USA

[how the failure of Heaven’s Gate (1980) affected his life] It was really a great trauma, as everyone knows. Since then, I’ve been unable to make any movie that I’ve wanted to make. I’ve been making the best of what is available. [People Magazine, Nov. 11, 1996]

[on The Deer Hunter (1978) post-9/11] They’ve been running The Deer Hunter (1978) like crazy on Bravo. And here is the whole goddamned Congress singing ‘God Bless America’ on the steps of the US Capitol. I said, ‘Holy shit, this is the ending of the movie.’ Do you get now, 20 years later, why that was in the movie? [July 2002]